1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a honeycomb structured body, a method for manufacturing a honeycomb structured body, and a honeycomb structured body manufacturing apparatus.
2. Discussion of the Background
In recent years, particulates, such as soot, contained in exhaust gases emitted from internal combustion engines of vehicles such as buses and trucks, and construction machines, have raised serious problems, as those particulates are harmful to the environment and the human body.
There have been proposed various honeycomb structured bodies made from porous ceramics, which serve as filters capable of capturing particulates in exhaust gases to purify the exhaust gases.
Conventionally, with respect to the honeycomb structured body of this kind, for example, there has been proposed a ceramic structured body in which a plurality of ceramic members, each having a structure in which a plurality of through holes are placed in parallel with one another in the longitudinal direction and the respective end faces of the through holes are plugged into a checkered pattern, with the opened and closed states being reversed on the gas inlet side and outlet side, and with adjacent through holes allowing gas to permeate from one to the other through a porous partition wall, are combined with one another. In such a ceramic structured body, the ceramic members are mutually combined by interposing a sealing compound. The sealing compound includes at least an inorganic fiber, an organic binder and an inorganic binder, and the degree of orientation of the inorganic fibers is set to 70% or more under the conditions of the fiber length of 20 to 300 μm and the fiber diameter of 3 to 15 μm (for example, see JP-A 2002-177719).
The contents of JP-A 2002-177719 are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.